7,92 ammo for mg15 and mg17

[McGyver]

What is normal distribution between ammo types in mg17 Belts and mg15 magasines ?
I recently emptied some mags and belts from the heinkel 115 we recovered in stavanger norway and the sequence there wereas this.

mg17: 1x B patrone 2x SMK-Lspur 3x Pmk

mg15: 1x B patrone 1x smk-Lspur 1x Pmk.
McGyver

[pitfighter]

Great pics - sorry to bring back from the dead - but very interesting.
These MG17/81 belts are fascinating to me - they are not the same as the 34/42 gurt.
In your photo you can see the little pin holding the links together.
Would love to see some more pics if any of the collectors have a section or two in their collection.

The MG15 mag is interesting, mine has aluminum dummies as the pushers, this one seems to have red plastic dummies, which is interesting, someone else may be able to expand on this.

Thanks for posting.

[McGyver]

The pushers in the mg15 mag is alu but have turned into red alu oxide (bauxite) in the salt water.
The belt (gurt) for the mg17 is quite odd since it was 600 rounds in one belt.
This design is seen on other belts as wll but is not much used.
McGyver

[pitfighter]

Thanks McGyver - I would never have guessed that was a salt water reaction - thank you.

I am trying to get a section of MG17/81 belt for my collection - it is quite similar to the French 7.5 -

[kradman]

Be carefull if there are any tracer rounds in the drum as they do sometimes start to smoke and can start fires when they dry out after coming out of water ,i have seen this a few times in the past

[pitfighter]

By his very interesting description of the loading pattern - there is a lot of tracer.

This was all I could find, but it doesn't show the order used.

MG15/MG17:
0=SMK
1=SMKH
2=Lspur Gelb
3=Lspur Weiss
4=Ub.m.Zerl
5=PMK
6=Beobachtung

[Matt L]

Great pics - sorry to bring back from the dead - but very interesting.
These MG17/81 belts are fascinating to me - they are not the same as the 34/42 gurt.
In your photo you can see the little pin holding the links together.

They're definitely different- the MG17 belt has similarly-shaped clips for each cartridge, but there is a hinge and pin connecting them rather than a coil. The joings have to be much more durable since they can be subject to significant G forces in a maneuvering combat aircraft. And it was possible to join any number of belts by putting a pin in- it's not like the MG34/42 type that had a little clip connector; so what one would find wouldn't be a special 600-round belt or a 1000-round belt- it's just however many belts joined to make the total desired.

And I'm not certain, but I don't think the MG81 used the same belt as the MG17; there was a disintegrating link type belt that it could use, but I don't know if it was the only one or not. That again had the same general shape clips for each cartridge, but like the aircraft cannon belts, they had a little rectangular loop on one side, and a bent clip on the other that connected each one to the next; they could be made non-disintegrating too as the clip had a curled end that I believe could have accepted a little pin to keep the belt in one piece. And it wasn't like a US disintegrating belt- the links weren't ejected, but they and the cartridge cases went into a bin for re-use. All German belts were reclaimed in fact- only cartridge cases, and only in some instances, were ejected.

[McGyver]

Be carefull if there are any tracer rounds in the drum as they do sometimes start to smoke and can start fires when they dry out after coming out of water ,i have seen this a few times in the past

The tracer rounds does not worry me, thats just a pyrotecnical insert in the back of the bullet...
Some people stil think that tracer is the coloured tip dipped into phosphoros
But the PMK and B Patrone is a different storry.
White phosphoros is not something you play with without getting burned...
All the ammo was wet and was burned of in a ammo furnace for disposal
I know there have been housefires and burndt fingers from these bastards.
There is a reason why hammer bulletpullers earleyer had a notice with them not to pull B patrones...


The worst case I have seen with WP is a divefriend who picked up a kilo lump and put it into his gear bag.
Not knowing what it was He called me when it started smoking.....
Lucky he was and it did not catch fire. (was submerged into water again)
and of cource disposed of properly later '
McGyver